To the Ends of the Earth Read Free

her—over our (for I am determined to use this long voyage in becoming wholly master of the sea affair)—over our furled canvas. Flurries of rain beat a retreat of kettle-drums over every inch of her. If that were not enough, there comes from forward and on this very deck the baaing of sheep, lowing of cattle, shouts of men and yes, the shrieks of women! There is noise enough here too. My hutch, or sty, is only one on this side of the deck of a half-a-dozen such, faced by a like number on the other side. A stark lobby separates the two rows and this lobby is interrupted only by the ascending and enormous cylinder of our mizzen mast . Aft of the lobby, Wheeler assures me, is the dining saloon for the passengers with the offices of necessity on either side of it. In the lobby dim figures pass or stand in clusters. They—we—are the passengers I must suppose; and why an ancient ship of the line such as this one has been so transformed into a travelling store-ship and farm and passenger conveyance is only to be explained by the straits my lords of the Admiralty are in with more than six hundred warships in commission.
    Bates, the saloon steward, has told me just this minute that we dine in an hour’s time at four o’clock. On my remarking that I proposed to request more ample accommodation he paused for a moment’s reflection, then replied it would be a matter of some difficulty and that he advised me to wait for a while. On my expressing some indignation that such a decrepit vessel should be used for such a voyage, he, standing in the door of the saloon with a napkin over his arm, lent me as much as he could of aseaman’s philosophy—as: Lord sir she’ll float till she sinks, and Lord sir she was built to be sunk; with such a lecture on lying in ordinary with no one aboard but the boatswain and the carpenter, so much about the easiness of lying to a hawser in the good old way rather than to a nasty iron chain that rattles like a corpse on a gibbet, he has sunk my heart clear down to her filthy ballast! He had such a dismissiveness of copper bottoms! I find we are no more than pitched within and without like the oldest vessel of all and suppose her first commander was none other than Captain Noah! Bates’s parting comfort to me was that he was sure she is “safer in a blow than many a stiffer vessel”. Safer! “For,” said he, “if we get into a bit of a blow she’ll render like an old boot.” To tell the truth he left me with much of the brandy’s good work undone. After all that, I found it was positively required I should remove all articles that I should need on the voyage from my chests before they were struck down below ! Such is the confusion aboard this vessel I can find no one who has the authority to countermand this singularly foolish order. I have resigned myself therefore, used Wheeler for some of this unpacking, set out my books myself, and seen my chests taken away. I should be angry if the situation were not so farcical. However, I had a certain delight in some of the talk between the fellows who took them off, the words were so perfectly nautical. I have laid Falconer’s Marine Dictionary by my pillow; for I am determined to speak the tarry language as perfectly as any of these rolling fellows!
LATER
    We have dined by the light of an ample stern window at two long tables in a great muddle. Nobody knew anything . There were no officers, the servants were harassed,the food poor, my fellow-passengers in a temper, and their ladies approaching the hysterics. But the sight of the other vessels at anchor outside the stern window was undeniably exciting. Wheeler, my staff and guide, says it is the remainder of the convoy. He assures me that the confusion aboard will diminish and that, as he phrases it, we shall shake down —presumably in the way the sand and gravel has shaken down, until—if I may judge by some of the passengers—we shall stink like the vessel. Your lordship may observe a certain